About two weeks ago, there was an announcement at the end of practice: an offer of a part-time job for the following week's Friday's fourth period. It caught my interest so the next day, I asked the announcer about it. I told him that it might be odd, but I would like to try this job. He said he would enquire if it was possible.

About two days later, he informed me that it would be possible for me to go, but there would be no payment, just food. I told him I would think of it, although I was pretty certain that I would go. After verifying I had nothing that night, I told him I'd join, and on Friday April 17^th, I walked to the front of the university's gymnasium to catch the bus picking us up.

I wasn't the only one going of course, 20 other judo members had also been selected. There were others that had already walked over there. I stopped at the new convenience store near Comsquare (where International Friday Night was held), bought some cough lozenges and masks, and then got ready to ride the bus.

I got a seat near the front, and no one else sat next to me. I guess that has its ups and downs. We were given "bentos" which is the Japanese word for packed lunch, and ate while we received an explanation about our job that day. After confirming with my friend Kato, I found out that our duty that day was to bring a "o-mikoshi", a portable shrine all the way up a mountain, pulling it using ropes, that it would take 3 hours in total, and that some part of the mountain were up to 45˚, which made it fairly steep.


We arrived at the city of Oiso, and were immediately directed to a lounge room to wait until the beginning of the festival, which was about one and a half hour later. We were given cookies, and our outfit for the evening. Everyone then pulled their phones out to relax and chat. I just laid down on my back pack, and grabbed about 20 minutes of sleep. After that, we started getting ready. This was the first time I would wear something like this. I had never really thought much about the outfit before, but it is true that the festival's workers all wear the same thing. I was glad to be able to take part in this. Not many foreigners get to do this, especially be treated like a Japanese and not a foreigner.








Just the first climb up the mountain was ridiculously steep and dangerous. Soon, we got the signal to start and we pulled a little bit on the rope. Now I thought it was going to be much harder, but with the staff there, and everyone, we had quite a lot of breaks. The whole way up, we would pull for about 10 seconds, then wait for 5 minutes. They needed to anchor the ropes all over the place to ensure the safety of the shrine and so that the rope wouldn't get too tangled up. They would called out: "Hippatte!" which I found out means to pull haha, and we would then all pull until we were told to stop. We did this the whole way up.

Now soon, it got really dark, and we couldn't see too much, which made it even more dangerous. You would often hear someone say: "Abunai!" which means dangerous, when they slipped or fell. Some of the old town folks were walking around with head lamps.

The whole thing felt like we were a team, which made it quite cool since like I said before, normally, I never could have been here. Thanks to my effort in class, this is what I get.

At about 5 minutes before reaching the top, the squad stopped us all to take a break. We were given onigiri and water while reporters and cameramen shot reports on the shrine and some of the judo guys. I was probably filmed in the background somewhere, but I didn't bother asking when it would be aired.


After that break, we carried the shrine up the last part of the mountain and the celebration started. They started bouncing the shrine up and down, like they do very often during festivals here in Japan. But what was even cooler is that I got to carry the actual shrine myself and bounce in a circle with everyone! It got quite heavy at one point, but I must say I was quite happy to have done it!

After that, they brought the shrine under a tent, and the formal part of the ceremony started. A man dressed in interesting clothes walked in and out carrying things, saying long monotone sentences which might have been a prayer? Names of the important related people were called out. When this whole thing was happening, I had found a spot higher up a tree so that I could see better. One of the man in front of me gave me a look, and told me to take off the ribbon I had on my head. After that, I looked around, and everyone else had done so already. They must have announced it, but I didn't even catch any of it or noticed when everyone took it off. Maybe it's just a custom during festivals.

Once that was done, we were served champagne, and were soon on our way down the hill. We all grabbed a part of the rope and walked slowly back. This was also dangerous but I made it back without injuries.

We handed the outfits back, and were served a meal. We only had about 20 minutes to eat before the bus left, but it wasn't too bad since I was given two bentos in total, which have since served me as lunch. We were dropped off in front of my dorm, lucky for me, and I walked back home, to my room, feeling accomplished and happy!